He Rejected A $37 Million Contract To Do What?
Would you reject a $37 million contract to fulfill your dream of becoming a farmer to feed the hungry and less fortunate? For most people, $37 million is THE big dream, but not for Mr Brown, who firmly believes that a life of greatness is accomplished through living a life in service to others.
I hope this article about Mr Brown inspires those who have thoughts of dedicating their lives to a bigger purpose to think about it deeply and build up the courage to walk a less traveled but fulfilling, meaningful and rewarding path. Please read this inspiring article and watch the short video of Mr Brown. I wish Mr Brown all the best and my prayers are with him.
Tsem Rinpoche
29-year-old Leaves NFL and $37 Million Contract to Become Farmer in Order to Feed the Hungry
By Walter Einenkel | Thursday Nov 27, 2014
St. Louis Rams center Jason Brown has left the NFL to pursue farming:
“My agent told me, ‘You’re making the biggest mistake of your life,’” Brown told CBS. “And I looked right back at him and I said, ‘No I’m not. No I’m not.”
Back in 2009, Brown signed a $37.5 million dollar contract with the Rams, making him the highest paid center in all of football. He earned about $25 million of that contract and decided to leave the final year’s $12.5 million on the table. Instead, he bought 1,000 acres of farmland in North Carolina.
Brown is doing this to help the less fortunate. He grows sweet potatoes and other vegetables and donates his harvest to food pantries. According to the New & Observer, he has given away 46,000 pounds of sweet potatoes and 10,000 pounds of cucumbers this fall.
Keep in mind the fact that Brown left the NFL at 29. He was going to get another pretty large contract to play for a few more years. Instead, in 2012 Brown began watching YouTube videos about farming in order to learn how to farm. He calls his farm the “First Fruits Farm.” And it’s not only fruits and vegetables—congratulations are in order:
Jason Brown, the former NFL star who retired from football so he could grow crops to feed the hungry, delivered his own child Tuesday at his Louisburg home. Brown and his wife, Tay, had planned to have help for the home birth, but the mother went through labor so quickly that Lunsford Bernard Brown III made his debut before the reinforcements could arrive.
Everything I’ve read about him so far is pretty great. So this Thanksgiving, raise a glass to Jason Brown and the many other kind souls who put people ahead of themselves.
Or view the video on the server at:
https://video.tsemtulku.com/videos/nfl-star-farming.mp4
Source: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/11/26/1347677/-29-year-old-leaves-NFL-and-37-million-contract-to-become-farmer-in-order-to-feed-the-hungry
For more interesting topics:
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- Stephon Marbury embraces China
- Do You Choose to Hate?
- My mom’s lifestyle was destructive to me
- Shell Oil Drilling in Arctic Ocean
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Thanks you for sharing this inspiring story of a footballer who rejected his offer just to live in his dream. This article is truly amazing and interesting of Mr. Jason Brown, big money couldn’t buy his heart as his passion and soul towards farming was much more greater.
I like Mr. Jason Brown action of taking what he want and contributing the rest for the unfortunate. Has a young man he’s abilities and thoughts are very vase, generous, kind and extraordinary. He’s always willing to share his knowledge and skill to generate more people into the field just to help them in their living.
I admire Mr Jason Brown’s confidence to overcome challenges and difficulties to achieve his dream and to understand the reality of life to serve and help others. Wonderful article with very good message on how gave fame and happiness into Mr. Jason Brown life.
It’s really inspiring for a star NFL player which is still rising at that time that just quit to provide food to feed the hungry. He has no regret and never turn back or even doubt with his decision but go all the way to benefit the unfortunate one.
What more inspiring here is that he doesn’t farm and not nothing about farming but dare to just dive into it and learn from YouTube to materialize his noble work. Jason definitely feels that to benefit others is more important and he definitely a great example for many people to believe in what you want to do and do it for others benefit.
This is another inspiring story of how people with a higher purpose in life give up the comfort of the materialistic world and focus out to help others. We always think when we have money, we can buy everything that we ever want and we will be happy, but this is just a delusion. Money can buy us happiness, but this happiness is only temporary. If the money can buy us real happiness, how come we keep buying?
Mr. Brown in this article is a sportsman who can make millions of dollars, that is a lot of money. However, he rejected a contract of $37 million and chose to become a farmer. He knew nothing about farming, but he took on the challenge. He learned how to farm from the internet. The main objective of him running a farm is to grow vegetables to give to the less fortunate, not for his own pocket.
Mr. Brown donated the first harvest of his farm to different charity organisations, in total he has given away 46,000 pounds of sweet potatoes and 10,000 pounds of cucumbers in the fall when the interview took place. Mr. Brown is a religious person, he learned from his religion that the real meaning of life is to serve others, so he took the leap of faith and became successful at it. He is an example of how serving others can bring greater meaning to our lives.
I learned that money is not the most important thing. It can’t bring us happiness but helping can. Just because of this, Jason Brown can go to plant potatoes and cucumbers and give them to the food pantries and give up the contract of $37 millions. Thank you Rinpoche for sharing this article.
Wow, Jason Brown is a good person! He is a good person because he plants potato and cucumber give poor people. Jason Brown is a kind person. Thank you.
Thank you for sharing this nice article about James Brown. $37 millions contract is a big dream for the most of us. We can’t bring $37 millions with us to the after life. It’s very rare to hear a superstar quit his or her job to benefit others. I wish James Brown all the best in what he is doing.
Wow! Mr Brown is so kind because he donates the first harvest of the season to the needy, poor and more. I can’t believe he actually gave up his 37 million dollar contract just to fulfil his dream of being a farmer. I am happy to hear that he was able to donate a total of 56,000 pounds of crops to different food pantries. Thank you Rinpoche for sharing this post. _/\_
Inspiring…Jason Brown a NFL footballer rejected contract of A $37 million to pursue farming which is totally new to him. He learned all about farming through YouTube videos…amazing. He was earning millions of dollars on the time of retirement to be a farmer .From the football fields to the sweet potato fields to help the less fortunate with his harvest. He never regreted it as he found happiness through helping the poor. He found joy in giving and happiness is his reward.
Wow…. he even delivered his own child. Not everyone is as brave as Jason Brown. Salute to him being so courage .
Thank you Rinpoche for sharing this inspiring post.
Brown is an example of knowing the purpose of his life and actually doing it. I can imagine his passion and drive in growing food to feed the poor. Money is not everything in life. I wish Brown’s example will be the inspiration to more people who will focus more on serving the needs of others and less on self. May Brown continues to be the beacon for the less fortunate. Thank you, Rinpoche for this sharing.
An awesome and kind heart of Mr. Brown. While he may provide entertainment to everyone on football but he choose on the selfless path which benefit more people in need.
＂视富贵如浮云＂,对一位名人来说，確是不容易，放下名与利，要回歸田园，要日晒雨淋，辛苦付出，而有了收成，不是为了自己而是利益窮人，这份情操值的尊敬与学习，愿天下所有富贵之人能与他看齐，取之社会，用之社会．让人人都有飯吃，有一屋棲身。
多谢仁波切分亨这些好人好事，让我们作为一个借鏡 ，**别问社会给了你什么？你又为社会奉獻了什么？**
“Love is best and most beautiful currency” – this is what Jason Brown said during his interview, it shows he understand what he is the greater thing he is looking for in life, which is benefiting others, other than making money and enjoying his fame.
Thank you Rinpoche for sharing, it inspires me, especially when Brown mentioned he learns how to farm by watching Youtube, it really surprise me – his farm is with good harvest… it shows that no one was born to be good in everything he/she is doing, but we can always learn and do it well as long as we are willing to, especially when we are doing it with bigger purpose and good motivation – to benefit others.
Truly an inspirational story of Jason Brown to leave fame, glory and all that money to become a farmer to feed the hungry. Rinpoche said it up most aptly – a life of greatness is accomplished through living a life in service to others.
Thank you.
In Asia especially, most of us grew up being taught life is about making money. The choices of what to study and what profession to pursue when we grow up is about making money. Getting that career break and making millions is the “dream”.
To be able to have a higher purpose and pursue that is a privilege. It is easy and tempting to take the money route but for someone like Mr. Brown being able to let go of that and pursue a noble profession of farming and feeding the less fortunate, that is nothing short of wisdom and compassion.
I’m sure despite being sure of his decision, life as a farmer is not without challenges but the reward is also far greater. Whichever path we choose there will always be challenges and difficulties to face, even the seemingly easy and lazy path. But the fulfillment, the happiness, the peace that we gets in return will be a big differences.
I want to shake this man’s hand and say to him that he is a legend and a hero. He has the best mindset to have with any human being. He chose others over himself. He chose to help others by putting in hard work of his own instead of living the dream fit for a king. That is amazing.
Farm work is not easy work too. Yet he chose that life. This man is one that is rare these days. To find people with this kind of mindset is hard and to hear a story like this stuns me, this man is truly pure. He can dedicate his life to this and he can give up so much personal gain for the gain of others. A rare and pure mindset.
This man is how it should be, I hope this story spreads and more and more people can take inspiration from him to do something good.
Wow. Just wow. Mr Brown is truly a special individual.
Money means a lot to many many people. Not only is money needed to survive, but money is looked as a major source of happiness for so many people. And 37 million dollars isn’t exactly a small amount of money, its a huge! For someone to turn down that amount of money, you would think that they have a good reason behind it. And Mr Brown sure did have a fantastic reason.
Mr Browns drive to spread kindness and compassion to others through feeding the homeless inspires me. He inspires me because he could have been rich, famous and glamorous, but instead he chose to give all that up to help others. It is not easy for someone to make this choice. And so therefore i salute you Mr Brown.
Thank you Rinpoche for sharing Mr Browns story with us. I am sure it will continue to inspire many others, just like how it has inspired me.
Dear Rinpoche,
Thank you for sharing this aspiring story. I really admire how he got the courage to turn down such an opportunity of a lifetime to walk the path of compassion that is not taken by many. I’m sure that anyone who is given the same kind of situation will just jump straight in without a second thought.
Mr Brown’s situation is somewhat similar to most dharma workers anywhere in my opinion. The only difference is the money point of view. Most dharma workers have to work outside and at dharma centre because they are not being paid working at the dharma centre. They have to sacrifice half of their time to work for money but instead they chose to contribute towards dharma. In Kechara, I personally had known a few people that left a very high paying job just to do dharma work. We are also very lucky to have a stipend system that supports us in Kechara. From my point of view, all of us are sacrificing our chance to have high salary for an opportunity to do dharma work where the salary might be just enough for us to live by. In the public eyes, we might be crazy. However, dharma is more valuable than high salary to us. This is similar to Mr Brown where he values living in service to others is much more value than high salary.
Life is not just about materialistic gains and financial gains. The meaning of life could be different for some people but people that live their life’s for others is a life well lived.
Humbly,
Chris
Thank you Rinpoche for sharing his story. I think what inspires me most about Mr Brown is that he had the proverbial good life, with the promise of an even better one, but realised that’s not what life is all about.
For us non-Americans, we will never be able to fully grasp the emotion, feeling and significance of being an NFL player. We are talking about a country of millions of people who aspire from birth to reach this position. Fathers talk about their unborn babies growing up to be linebackers; people gather for Monday Night Football every week, as a part of their tradition. People will train for years, giving up their childhoods, teenager years, adulthood, parties, fun, etc. for this one goal in mind. The NFL is an industry in itself; billions of dollars are circulated as a result of advertising, merchandise, contracts, endorsements.
When you understand a little bit of that, you’ll understand the “sacrifice” this man made because it’s not just US37.5mil he gave up but an billion-dollar industry that he turned his back on.
And for what? Farming, which is a struggling and uncertain industry in the States that’s vulnerable to the weather and pests. On top of that, he gives up the first harvest of his crop for others; if the second harvest fails, he’s stuck and has no returns for his efforts. He basically gave up a future of guaranteed wealth for himself, to live an uncertain one for the benefit of others.
More attention should be given to people like this who put what they believe in into action for the benefit of others. This is what real faith does – putting the suffering of others above yourself.
在现实中，并不是每个人都可以放下身段 、放弃金钱、地位与离开舒适地带来面对生活上的一切。
但这位年约三十岁的Mr Brown真的可以做到了。因为他的慈悲，让他放弃了过亿美金的续约成为最高的薪金的足球选手。因为他的慈悲，让他选择离开他的舒适地带和放下身段；从一名高薪金的足球选手变成为一名农夫。然后，亲自耕种马铃薯与其他的蔬菜和将此农作物捐赠予需要的人。而因为他的慈悲更让他觉得爱是要给予任何一个人，不分彼此。
Mr Brown所作的一切是值得赞赏。希望会有更多人可以像Mr Brown这样明智的选择来回馈社会，利益更多人。
感谢仁波切在此分享这位年轻有为Mr Brown的故事。愿他的努力与付出可以得到更多人的赞同与帮助更多人。
It is heartwarming to see Mr Brown chosen farming and feeding the community instead of getting a $37m contract. He has a big heart and very compassion towards the people in need. Not many people would forgo the comfort zone and let go of everything to serve the society.
I wish him great success for his work.
Thank you for this blog post Rinpoche.
Mr Jason Brown realized the true wealth on earth, which is it bountiful natural resources.
If, we take a step back and look, we will see that almost every dollar earned by the global society is used to exchange for harvest be it cotton for clothing, vegetables and live crop for food.
Seeds is the one currency on this earth that is valuable to every living being on earth with no exception. Seeds grow into fruits, vegetables, wood and bark that supply food, shelter, clothing and medicine. Even livestock come from seeds that we know as eggs.
When we realize the abundance of natural resources and reconnect to our nature to respectfully harvest this bounty, we will not fear scarcity. This will help us develop generosity and courage to step out of the social flow, just like Jason Brown.
I wish Jason Brown another successful harvest to feed more people in need!
It’s truly inspiring to read about his decision to forgo his contract for the sake of the less fortunate. It’s not very often we hear of others making such a noble choice.
I guess Brown realizes that helping others bring him more joy and depth to his life than earning the extra millions. After a while we realize that money only buys us comfort and convenience but not happiness.
I love it when people just give it all away. I couldn’t sleep at night in a world without these selfless wonderful people!
What a meaningful way to live one’s life! I wish Jason Brown much happiness and success in his desire to serve others.
I have signed the petition and is supportive of Brown’s decision in feeding the hunger. He is such an inspiration spending his wealth in meaningful and benefitting ways. Having wealth is a blessings, more so when it is being used to relieve others’ suffering. Also Brown shown us nothing is impossible as long as we put our mind to it, benefitting others is the purpose of our life. Thank you!
It always makes me happy to read that rich and famous people like Mr Brown has chosen to put his materialistic gain behind and to do something that will be of benefit to thousands of people in need.
Farming isn’t as simple as planting the seeds in to the ground, watering the land everyday and a few months later there will be vegetables. Farming is something that requires diligence, patience and effort in order to have a bountiful harvest.
Further more in Mr Brown’s case, he isn’t doing this for any personal profit, he is doing this so that the vegetables can be donated to food pantries which will eventually be used to cook food for the poor and homeless to eat.
This is really much better than playing football, winning games for the team just to make the manager of the team and the fans happy.
This will go much further by making sure that the poor or homeless will never be hungry.
Thank you Rinpoche for sharing this heartwarming article!